aviation
Pluralaviations (some meanings)
- 1The activity of flying and operating aircraft.
Strict limits on pilots' working hours are meant to make aviation safer.
The aviation authorities grounded the whole fleet after the second engine failure.
Similarflying
Note
The sense that most often works as a modifier, standing in front of another noun: the aviation industry, the aviation authorities. An adjective narrows it to one branch of flying, as in military aviation. It sits close to the aircraft-building industry; the difference is pilots versus factories: this sense is the flying and running of aircraft, that one the making of them.
- 2The design, building, and piloting of aircraft, considered as a skill or a field of knowledge.
The museum traces aviation from wooden gliders to supersonic jets.
Her textbook covers every part of aviation, from wing design to navigation.
Similaraeronautics
Note
A word that looks back to birds: English borrowed it from French aviation, built on Latin avis, "bird". Taken apart in English it is avi- plus -ation, the ending that turns a root into the name of an activity, so the craft of building and flying machines is named, quite literally, for doing what birds do.
- 3The industry that builds aircraft.
The region's economy depends on aviation, with two large aircraft plants nearby.
Wartime orders turned aviation into one of the country's largest employers, with factories turning out bombers around the clock.
- 4In military use, aircraft considered collectively.
Enemy aviation struck the bridge twice before dawn.
The division commander requested more aviation to cover the river crossing.
Similaraircraft
Note
Commanders' language, in which the word works as a collective mass noun: a report speaks of enemy aviation striking a bridge or of a request for more aviation, never of an aviation or three aviations. Individual machines are still counted as aircraft; this use gathers them into one force, which is why it almost never takes a plural.
- 5A gin-based cocktail mixed with lemon juice, maraschino liqueur, and crème de violette.
The bar's aviation is pale violet and pleasantly tart.
We'll have two aviations and a glass of red wine, please.
Practice
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Origin
Borrowed from French aviation, which is derived from Latin avis (“bird”). It can also be analysed as avi- + -ation.